The SMS Journey, Part 1

When I first heard the term “Safety Management System,” or SMS, I thought it was just another fad from management schools and I gave it the same respect that I gave to Total Quality Management (TQM), Management By Objectives (MBO) and other programs designed to make headquarters suits feel like they were making a difference. 

Yes, I promptly ignored SMS and hoped it would go away. But when the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) adopted it as mandatory in 2006, I realized that even if it proved a waste of time, I would have to, at the very least, go through the SMS motions. And then something unexpected happened. SMS proved not only useful, but it made me a better and safer pilot. SMS has become more than an academic process for my flight department, it has become a philosophy.  

If you haven’t taken the SMS plunge yet, or if you are still just going through the motions, please consider a short story that illustrates how useful working through a problem with SMS can be. And then, consider starting an SMS program of your own or fully embracing the one you already have.

Smarter Together

The first time I saw our mechanics tow the Gulfstream G450 into our narrow hangar, I was alarmed that there were no markings for the center of the hangar floor and by how quickly the entire operation took place. It was as if they were being timed and got bonus points for bravado. I cautioned them that when towing aircraft, the best you can do is a tie: no damage to the aircraft or hangar; there are no prizes for coming in first. They explained the speed was necessary to get over the bump of the hangar door tracks and that they were using a crack in the pavement for alignment. I told them to stop when the main gear was about 5 ft. short of the hangar door tracks and verify the wings would clear before proceeding. We did that and I thought, “job done.”

Over the years I noticed that the aircraft’s position on the hangar floor varied by 5 ft. or more. With a wingspan of 77 ft. 4 in., we should have had ample space within the hangar door opening of 95 ft. 4 in., ideally 9 ft. on each wing tip. My next solution was to paint a line down the middle of the hangar. Once again, I thought, “job done.” While that improved our accuracy, we still seemed to vary about 5 ft. left and right. The nosewheel may have been on my painted centerline, but the main gear were often anything but equidistant from that line. My autocratic rule as their leader wasn’t as effective as I had hoped.

A few years later, our company asked me to replace the G450 with a G500, which has a wingspan of 86 ft. 4 in. empty and 87 ft. 1 in. with a full load of fuel. Now we would have only 4 ft. on each wing and our plus or minus 5 ft. tolerance wasn’t going to be good enough. Our safety officer thought using the SMS process would give each member of the team a chance to “buy in” to my earlier solutions: slow down, don’t proceed unless the nose gear is precisely on centerline. So, expecting only to have my solutions validated by the group, I filed a Hazard Identification and Tracking form, something our safety officer called a “HIT.” What happened next surprised me.

The team immediately identified two reasons behind our accuracy problem. First, we were approaching too fast, trying to build momentum over the steep rise of pavement just before the hangar door tracks. Second, even if the nosewheel was on centerline that didn’t mean we would have the wings centered if the main gear were not also on centerline. That much, I thought, was obvious. But each member of the team identified a different part of the problem. Then the group found a solution that many of us never considered.

• Problem: not all our pilots and ground support personnel understood correct marshalling signals and the result was pilots trying to align the aircraft as best they could, quite often ending up with the nosewheel on centerline and the main gear several feet left or right. Only our former airline and Air Force pilots had ever been formally trained on how to give and receive marshalling signals. None of our ground crew had ever received correct training. Solution: a back to basics marshalling course for everyone.
• Problem: the tow team believed they could “save” a bad starting position with creative moves before the wings reached the hangar. Quite often they could get the aircraft properly aligned, but more times than not they ended up with “good enough.” Solution: paint additional lines prior to the hangar door, giving maximum tolerances for the main gear. (If the main gear were not within their lines, the tow team wasn’t allowed to proceed and had to back the airplane out for another attempt.)
• Problem: the rise in the asphalt prior to the hangar door tracks meant a minimum speed was needed to overcome the inertia of the aircraft going “uphill” into the hangar. I thought the problem was the hangar track itself was beyond repair. But that wasn’t the problem at all.  Solution: rebuild the asphalt prior to the hangar door tracks to make the slope more gradual.

It took a few days to train everyone in proper marshalling procedures, a few weeks to get the new lines painted, and a few months to get the slope regraded. A year later we took delivery of our newer (and wider) aircraft and getting the aircraft precisely on centerline is a matter of routine now. The SMS process allowed us to come up with innovative solutions and, just as importantly, gave everyone a deeper understanding of the problem and the reasons behind our new procedures. On those few occasions where the aircraft isn’t properly aligned, there haven’t been any complaints about having to back the aircraft up for a second try. The entire team has joined me in my zeal for precision.

The HIT process also combined with our Flight Operations Quality Assurance (FOQA) system to improve the way we fly. For example, before we adopted an SMS, FOQA identified an occasional unstable approach at Hanscom Field, Bedford, Massachusetts (KBED), our home field. Many locals prefer to fly inside three radio towers that underlie what would be a normal base turn to Runway 29, and we were no exception. When FOQA identified this as a problem, we thought it was a problem with FOQA, not us. This bugged me because it was our lone exception in an otherwise perfect FOQA report each quarter. I called other local operators with FOQA, and it seemed they all accepted the blemish, there was nothing to be done about it. 

But one of our pilots saw this as a case for what SMS gurus call the Continuous Improvement Opportunity Program (CIOP). The team realized immediately that the solution was to fly outside the towers, for a final approach that was about 0.5 mile longer than what most consider standard. We worried about what our tower would think about us hogging a little more airspace, but a quick phone call put that to rest. Our SMS program spurred us to stop accepting unstable approaches as beyond our control.

I think every flight operation can benefit from an active SMS program; it will not only make your operation safer, it will also forge your personnel into a team where everyone feels empowered to contribute.

The process of adopting an SMS takes time but is manageable, as we explain in Part 2 of this article.